Gdansk, Poland
BJK architects were responsible for the expansion of the largest business center in northern Poland, the Olivia Business Center. They were asked to create an extra structure that will be both environmentally friendly and also employee-friendly so they created a fully sustainable construction.
The Olivia Prime project was short-listed for a 2021 International Architecture Award from The Chicago Athenaeum and The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.
Olivia Prime is a complex of two buildings, 15 stories above ground, and 3 underground stories, with a connector- 2 stories lower. It is a part of Olivia Business Center in Gdansk, placed by the Tricity’s (Gdansk, Sopot, Gdynia) axis.
It has been built in two stages: the first one was Prime A in 2018, then there was Prime B in 2020. The connection of the two resulted in a single-floor augmentation of 3600 sqm of usable space and a total of 55000 sqm.
The basic assumption of the 2nd stage was a direct continuation of the 1st. For example, the use of anodized sheet on the facade. The architects wanted to achieve consistency without the feeling of design repetition.
They have reduced the number of glass facades in favor of sheet aluminum elements. Hence the two-story frames with a characteristic undercut. They obtained an additional light and shade effect by varying the inclination and changing the vertical rhythm.
The inspiration here was sails or rather sails responding to gusts of wind, thanks to which the facade gained a lively character.
The architects have designed the glass bay windows in opposition to the Prime A loggias, as well as in the case of decorative clips with colored illumination.
The arcade on the Olivia Star, skyscraper, the side made it possible to enlarge the public space and let light into the courtyard. The columns in the arcade are made of precast concrete with an imprint on the facture Reckli.
Greenery is foreseen between the buildings in the form of a meadow inscribed in soft outlines also present in the drawing of the roofs of the entrances to the building. On the ground floor, wood has been used as façade’ s and hall construction columns.
Thanks to the glass facade, the interior of the building has access to daylight.
Natural lighting reduces the cost of electricity.
The design of the facade also protects against excessive heating of the rooms by solar radiation, which reduces the cost of air conditioning thanks to the use of selective coatings on the glass.
Three-pane glass packages reduce the cost of heating the building. The rooms can be ventilated thanks to open windows.
Moreover, there are seven terraces (4 small, with distinctive pergolas, and 3 large on the rooftops) and on every floor two brass color loggias (19 in total). The roof of the building is largely a biologically active surface (green roof).
Olivia Prime has energy-saving vertical transport systems: standby mode, LED lighting, variable speed drive, energy recovery.
All partitions of the building were adjusted to the Technical Conditions for 2021. Thanks to modern solutions, Olivia Prime is energetically secured.
It is powered from 3 independent sources, it has also been equipped with a set of power generators and internal power lines between the buildings, enabling powering the entire building during power outages from the outside.
Olivia Prime also has emergency running water tanks and all sanitary ware is in the BMS system.
Project: Olivia Prime
Architects: BJK Architekci Sp. z o. o.
Client: Olivia Prime B Sp. z o.o.
Contractor: Pekabex S.A.
Photographer: Paweł Klein
